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So to recap, you're fine with battling and defeating characters like Sauron and the Witch-king, as long as we don't actually kill them with the flimsy excuse of an NPC drama sequence doing it for us at the end of the fight after we've battered their morale to dust?

Just so I know what's going through your mind.

Not even close. That's just what you want to present as my argument to suit your own, and I resent that.

Not even close. That's just what you want to present as my argument to suit your own, and I resent that.

I'll leave wh, Rad, and yourself in peace.

I have no interest in this discussion anymore.

So soon?

I was asking it because I wasn't certain. Apparently I was wrong, so do please enlighten me; how do you want to defeat them then without it being lore-breaking? I don't see any way. It will always be extremely far-fetched and quite silly to defeat (or even engage) such characters, just as it was with Saruman, Belryg and Dragons.

[I]In the sea without lees standeth the Bird of Hermes.
[/I][I]When all his feathers be from him gone, He standeth still here as a stone.
Here is now both white and red, And all so the stone to quicken the dead[/I][I].
The Bird of Hermes is my name, Eating my wings to make me tame.[/I]

But then, none of my characters have ever fought either of those two, so they can consider your tales of having done so as being complete fictions. Nice stories, with no basis in (game world) fact.

I think you've had one too many second breakfasts. You're essentially saying "I don't like how Turbine handled Helm's Deep because it's lore-breaking. I demand an apology for breaking the lore." Sapience then says, in no uncertain terms, that yes, they break lore all the time for the sake of gameplay and that they've been doing this for the last six years, and your response is something like, "Well I didn't take part in those specific lore-breaking instance so it doesn't count...So nyah!"

I'm not sure what it is you've been doing all these years, that you've managed to avoid all of these lore-breaking scenarios (certainly not taking part in the epic storyline in any form or fashion), but that doesn't invalidate the fact that Turbine has been developing the game in a similar vein for the last six years. That this has finally bled its way into the epic storyline is really moot at this point, though I realize you're arguing otherwise. Sapience's point is that such behavior should not be a huge surprise, and certainly not something worthy of an apology. Complaining about the magnitude of lore-breaking is one thing. Complaining about the very act of lore-breaking is ridiculously late to the party. Do you mean to say you never took issue with the epic storyline directing you to Tom Bombadil's house? I suppose next you'll find fault with the free-to-play/micro-transaction model? How about Legendary Items?

I think you've had one too many second breakfasts. You're essentially saying "I don't like how Turbine handled Helm's Deep because it's lore-breaking. I demand an apology for breaking the lore." Sapience then says, in no uncertain terms, that yes, they break lore all the time for the sake of gameplay and that they've been doing this for the last six years, and your response is something like, "Well I didn't take part in those specific lore-breaking instance so it doesn't count...So nyah!"

I'm not sure what it is you've been doing all these years, that you've managed to avoid all of these lore-breaking scenarios (certainly not taking part in the epic storyline in any form or fashion), but that doesn't invalidate the fact that Turbine has been developing the game in a similar vein for the last six years. That this has finally bled its way into the epic storyline is really moot at this point, though I realize you're arguing otherwise. Sapience's point is that such behavior should not be a huge surprise, and certainly not something worthy of an apology. Complaining about the magnitude of lore-breaking is one thing. Complaining about the very act of lore-breaking is ridiculously late to the party. Do you mean to say you never took issue with the epic storyline directing you to Tom Bombadil's house? I suppose next you'll find fault with the free-to-play/micro-transaction model? How about Legendary Items?

In addition to this, can you imagine the number of unhappy players if they found out they could not participate in the Battle of Helm's Deep? It's one of the iconic places of LOTR. It's the same as telling people they can never play a Hobbit because Hobbits don't leave the Shire. This is one of those balancing issues between Gameplay and Lore that Turbine has been walking on a tightrope for the last 7 years.

Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out & proclaiming "WOW, what a ride!"Continuing the never ending battle to keep Lobelia Sackville-Baggins in check

That's why I deplore Jackson's treatment of LotR and I flatly refuse to go see whatever travesty he has created out of The Hobbit.

I liked the LOTR movies and I will be seeing Part 2 of The Hobbit. Why? Because I'm going to see a Peter Jackson film, not a faithful recreation of his works on film. That's why I enjoyed the new Star Trek films, yes, they are not Star Trek but IMHO, and it's my opinion, good sci fi flicks. Same with the Hobbit.

Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, totally worn out & proclaiming "WOW, what a ride!"Continuing the never ending battle to keep Lobelia Sackville-Baggins in check

I liked the LOTR movies and I will be seeing Part 2 of The Hobbit. Why? Because I'm going to see a Peter Jackson film, not a faithful recreation of his works on film. That's why I enjoyed the new Star Trek films, yes, they are not Star Trek but IMHO, and it's my opinion, good sci fi flicks. Same with the Hobbit.

Funny you should say that, because the new Star Trek movies are lousy sci-fi. With all that transwarp nonsense, they're borked things something awful; there's stuff like ridiculously inconsistent travel times too, and there are real howlers like having a singularity form inside a ship without the whole thing imploding in an instant. What, it can destroy a planet in minutes but a ship is merely 'compromised'? And that's nothing compared to the enormous gaffe in the second movie - Bones now has a way to bring the dead back to life! Oh look, there goes the dramatic tension. Did all the lens flare stop you from noticing that?

As for the Hobbit movie - the CGI action scenes were just badly done, they looked fake as hell because of the lack of believable physics. Hardly a good thing in any movie, it doesn't matter if it's fantasy or not, or if it's by Peter Jackson or not.

If the game was supposed to be an exact replication of Middle Earth that idea was ditched long ago.

I've got the shovel if you've got the graveyard!

Glorgnorbor,A Rock And A Hard Place,Stop by our Friday music shows! 4PM EST at the Bree West Gate on Dwarrowdelf!If a Malledhrim Soldier dies alone in the forest because of canceled quest, will it make a sound? ~Leixy
Took me a few years, but I renewed my signature :)

We have to remember this is a game, Turbine are not creating a new LotR's book or chapter here, it's a PC game and for me as a PC gamer playing LotRO I have certain expectations including that I can participate in someway in the major set pieces of the book. As I mentioned before, lore breaks are disappointing, but not participating the Battle of the Hornburg would be even more disappointing.

Its a game to us and a buisness to turbine. And that will always be the seperating factor between us and them.Would you be disappointed in not doing the battle of hornburg if they had done due diligence and made 3-6 group instances? I know I would have been much happier with the typical amounts of raids instead of this debacle. But that is for each of us to decide for ourselves. Here for me lies the problem, with the last two expacs that have had raids they have been so poorly designed and implemented that they thought the easier road would be big battles. As it was probably easier I believe the outcome will be the same... very lackluster!

will I be paying cash to get this expac? NO I will in fact wait until it goes on sale then buy it with TPs and would suggest this for anyone with a single doubt about the game.

Funny you should say that, because the new Star Trek movies are lousy sci-fi. ...

It is not part of the general definition of sci-fi that events and the science have to be accurate. Sci Fi and Fantasy are just opposite ends of the same setting, whose point is to create a fantastic, mysterious and phenomenal stage, transcending reality, for the action to play out in.

Personally, I am a friend of "hard sci fi". But using my view to point at Star Trek with derision is like saying "You´re playing the LEGO wrong"; the point of sci fi and fantasy is to break the normal rules. I can still enjoy the myriad of sci fi-esque products out there that fall flat on their faces when looked at with scientific scrutiny - but are FUN to watch/read/experience.

The only relevant question is whether the events are BELIEVABLE within their own universe. Havent seen the latest Star Trek, but having Bones reanimate people as you describe might violate this.

For me this all has something to do with a gamedesign decision Turbine has made a long time ago. It's the role of the player in middle earth.
In the start, in 2007, when I begun playing the game, I was totally satisfied with just being a minor character, somebody who helps the fellowship here and there, but not more like e.g. Barliman Butterbur did.
Even more, I liked it, it was a respectful approach to Tolkien's work. I just enjoyed being there, being able to visit some of the most iconic places of middle earth, that simple fact was enough for me.

I guess: not for all players. And not enough for Turbine.
Somehow the idea evolved more and more, that every character, every player, has to be some sort of forgotten main protagonist of the story. Following the footsteps of the fellowship wasn't enough anymore. You are one big hero, who saves middle earth all the time. This already started a bit with Moria and Mirkwood, but it got pretty obvious with Isengart, when my player character saved the whole Grey Company not only once - without my help they wouldn't even have gotten out of the trollshaws. And I was already best buddy with every member of the fellowship, Elrond and Galadriel - but then, also Saruman wants to win my followship, because I'm such a powerful warrior, with seducing me with even more power ... well, they took it too far for me at some point of the story.

The Problem is, none of that is totally lore-breaking, but the idea behind that is:
Every player wants the feeling of being the hero of the day, the one who saves middle earth over and over again - so let's design the game and the stories that way, so the players feel like great Heros that are on par with Aragaorn, Legolas and Gimli.
My question is: is that really the case? Do we, as the players, want to play a major role in this? Or do we just want to visit middle earth, more as observers, than as main protagonists? Maybe it's the difference between making a game for Tolkien nerds and a mass audience, I don't know. The decision has already been made, and in that cause of that descision, naturally, our player character has to take part in the battle of helm's deep, no way around it.

In the end, many MMOs think this way, and try to give their players the impression that their character, especially their character, saves the whole world, no one else. E.g. Guild Wars 2 did that as well in the personal storylines.
But, I think, players are not stupid, everybody knows we are playing a MMO, we know everybody gets told the same story. And that it isn't true. We know the world is static and we don't change anything with our deeds. As an example, a simple quest: I bring this poor fellow ten hides, because it's cold and he needs them to make a coat or something, but this guy will stay cold forever, the next player has to deliver ten hides again - this poor soul lives in hell, he will never get a coat. We do not change a bit in that world, and we all know it, we just iognore it because it's part of the game mechanic. Where do the tons of hides go, that we all deliver to that poor guy - who cares? Maybe he got a big hides busniess running in the background - who knows? What we know: we are one of million heros, that all save the day, every day. But instead of gamedesign recognizing that fact, they continously ignore it and think they can fool players with epic single-player-instance experiences. And I believe the big battles will try the same, again. "You have won the battle of helm's deep - single handed - congratulations!"

Oh it is, although not because they turned every single player-character into 'Mary Sue' by having them repeatedly save Middle-earth, and making everyone else look weak or useless (that's just bad writing) but because there wouldn't be anything like enough time to fit it all in. Doing all that travelling backwards and forwards would take forever at Middle-earth's 'real' scale. Just one bit of that, running around gathering the Grey Company, would take way more time than there is available for it in the plot (if you bear in mind where the player-characters are supposed to be when they start doing that).

Funny you should say that, because the new Star Trek movies are lousy sci-fi. With all that transwarp nonsense, they're borked things something awful; there's stuff like ridiculously inconsistent travel times too, and there are real howlers like having a singularity form inside a ship without the whole thing imploding in an instant. What, it can destroy a planet in minutes but a ship is merely 'compromised'? And that's nothing compared to the enormous gaffe in the second movie - Bones now has a way to bring the dead back to life! Oh look, there goes the dramatic tension. Did all the lens flare stop you from noticing that?

As for the Hobbit movie - the CGI action scenes were just badly done, they looked fake as hell because of the lack of believable physics. Hardly a good thing in any movie, it doesn't matter if it's fantasy or not, or if it's by Peter Jackson or not.

So you just hate the world?

Anyhow, Sci-fi and fantasy is what they are, movies do depict these two.

On helms deep, the Battle and fighting alongside theoden is not far-fetched for all we know we are just strangers in a foreign land helping them out.

No, just the way big Hollywood movies tend to be dumb as rocks nowadays.

Anyhow, Sci-fi and fantasy is what they are, movies do depict these two.

So? The two 'rebooted' Star Trek movies are weaksauce sci-fi, full of plot holes and with the 'sci' bit lacking anything even resembling internal consistency or common sense even by Star Trek standards. As for the first Hobbit movie it's distinctly average, woefully lacking compared to the LOTR movies.

On helms deep, the Battle and fighting alongside theoden is not far-fetched for all we know we are just strangers in a foreign land helping them out.

Of course it's far-fetched for there to be extra Elves, Dwarves and hobbits there... it's just that the whole game has become so far-fetched it's no longer worth arguing about.

The star trek universe had had a way to bring people back to life since the first transporter got working. The computers are big enough to hold peoples information so that if they die they could come back by using the stored info to reassemble the info into the people.

The only relevant question is whether the events are BELIEVABLE within their own universe.

It's called "willing suspension of disbelief" and, yes, Star Trek has always had problems with that. So does Hollywood generally when it comes to SF (and the Hollywood use of the term "SciFi" is one of the reasons some people dislike that particular term and wish to have it disassociated from SF).

SF and Fantasy are not "opposite ends" of a spectrum. They are closely related. Indeed, SF is actually a sub-set of Fantasy. SF settings are generally real world (or postulated other times of the real world) with at least one known law of physics deliberately broken....and often more than one. One of the most common ones to break is the speed of light being an absolute upper bound for any material object. Few authors--L. Sprague deCamp probably being the most prominent--keep to the C limit, but even deCamp had to sweep the energy requirements of interstellar travel under the rug to make his universe work.

As Prof. Tolkien himself said, "Suspension of disbelief does not mean hanging it by the neck until dead."

It's called "willing suspension of disbelief" and, yes, Star Trek has always had problems with that.

Not like it does now, because J J Abrams isn't even trying to have it make sense or be internally consistent. Even the lighting on the Enterprise's bridge now defies rational explanation - it's the sort of thing Galaxy Quest poked fun at

Now THAT, I think, is the nauseating justification it has ever been my displeasure to read.

I have to agree. That scene when the elves marched in was ludicrous, not only because it was lore-breaking, but because it was just plain silly. (C'mon, goose-stepping elves, really?? Almost as bad as having Gandalf whack Denethor with his staff.)

Sure, but a thoroughly expected one, in my opinion. This expansion centers about an iconic battle, and requiring players to park the characters we've invested hundreds (or thousands!) of hours playing while we skin up as Generic Rohirrim #26 is a bridge too far for an entertainment company.

I still don't accept Rune-keepers as appropriate for this setting. But that opinion isn't really worth much in the grand scheme of things, and you know what? I held out for a year, but then started an RK and have had fun with him. He's level 85 .

Khafar

Hm. The battle was iconic? Only for movie fans. It was a large percentage of the money and screen-time poured into Jackson's trilogy. The movie adaptation is an amazing movie-experience, I bought it on DVD then later on extended Blu-Ray... but Jackson's exercise of a creative license doesn't establish lore. Yes, the fight was predominant in the movies.

But the books? It was hardly a blip. The battle is being made epic in LOTRO simply because that's the sort of thing that the consumer is expected to want to consume, not because it had much to do with lore.

For me this all has something to do with a gamedesign decision Turbine has made a long time ago. It's the role of the player in middle earth.
In the start, in 2007, when I begun playing the game, I was totally satisfied with just being a minor character, somebody who helps the fellowship here and there, but not more like e.g. Barliman Butterbur did.
Even more, I liked it, it was a respectful approach to Tolkien's work. I just enjoyed being there, being able to visit some of the most iconic places of middle earth, that simple fact was enough for me.

I guess: not for all players. And not enough for Turbine.
Somehow the idea evolved more and more, that every character, every player, has to be some sort of forgotten main protagonist of the story. Following the footsteps of the fellowship wasn't enough anymore. You are one big hero, who saves middle earth all the time. This already started a bit with Moria and Mirkwood, but it got pretty obvious with Isengart, when my player character saved the whole Grey Company not only once - without my help they wouldn't even have gotten out of the trollshaws. And I was already best buddy with every member of the fellowship, Elrond and Galadriel - but then, also Saruman wants to win my followship, because I'm such a powerful warrior, with seducing me with even more power ... well, they took it too far for me at some point of the story.

The Problem is, none of that is totally lore-breaking, but the idea behind that is:
Every player wants the feeling of being the hero of the day, the one who saves middle earth over and over again - so let's design the game and the stories that way, so the players feel like great Heros that are on par with Aragaorn, Legolas and Gimli.
My question is: is that really the case? Do we, as the players, want to play a major role in this? Or do we just want to visit middle earth, more as observers, than as main protagonists? Maybe it's the difference between making a game for Tolkien nerds and a mass audience, I don't know. The decision has already been made, and in that cause of that descision, naturally, our player character has to take part in the battle of helm's deep, no way around it.

In the end, many MMOs think this way, and try to give their players the impression that their character, especially their character, saves the whole world, no one else. E.g. Guild Wars 2 did that as well in the personal storylines.
But, I think, players are not stupid, everybody knows we are playing a MMO, we know everybody gets told the same story. And that it isn't true. We know the world is static and we don't change anything with our deeds. As an example, a simple quest: I bring this poor fellow ten hides, because it's cold and he needs them to make a coat or something, but this guy will stay cold forever, the next player has to deliver ten hides again - this poor soul lives in hell, he will never get a coat. We do not change a bit in that world, and we all know it, we just iognore it because it's part of the game mechanic. Where do the tons of hides go, that we all deliver to that poor guy - who cares? Maybe he got a big hides busniess running in the background - who knows? What we know: we are one of million heros, that all save the day, every day. But instead of gamedesign recognizing that fact, they continously ignore it and think they can fool players with epic single-player-instance experiences. And I believe the big battles will try the same, again. "You have won the battle of helm's deep - single handed - congratulations!"

Well said. As others have mentioned, so much of storytelling relies on a willing suspension of disbelief, so I suppose it boils down to how much each player is willing and able to suspend his / her own disbelief. And I suppose to some extent *that* depends on individual differences - including how grandiose I am. Do I *need* to feel myself some forgotten, main protagonist? or am I content to lend a hand to the small deeds that turn the wheels of great events, with an occasional glimpse of those who outwardly at least seem to be the main protagonists - those big names in the lore of the age in which we live? What helps me suspend my own disbelief to some extent is that even in the books, Gandalf is always disappearing for a day or a month or a few years, checking in on folks while prompting and nudging others to do their part, small though it may be (or seem). Perhaps our character, in the game, is one such figure who has been prompted or nudged... At the same time, I have to admit that some of my most enjoyable gameplay moments were when I got to live vicariously as Frodo or Samwise or Boromir, and re-live those remarkable moments of the breaking of the Fellowship... how cool was that?! And even, in the final epic storyline (prior to HD), being able to glimpse from afar how things fare with the Grey Company, through the medium of the minstrel's map... I found those to be clever game design choices.

There are a lot of things that Tolkien says about Middle-earth, and he leaves a lot of things un-said. (Sometimes, I'm guessing, he leaves them un-said intentionally, and sometimes, well, because there's just no time to say everything that could be said, or to connect *all* of the dots.) For me, it's not lore-breaking to try to connect some of the dots or to try to fill in some of the blank spaces. Just as an example, from the books we know very little about what happened to and with the Grey Company up to the point where they finally meet Aragorn, so, for me anyway, it's fine to try to fill in some of those gaps, and to incorporate the player-character into that particular storyline. What's lore-breaking, however, is to interject something that runs counter to the internal 'rules' of the world, or to make a well-known character from the canonical lore (e.g., Bilbo, Gandalf, Aragorn, Elrond) do or say something that runs totally counter to what we know of their character from Tolkien himself. I'm not talking so much about *events* from those characters' lives: Gandalf and Elrond, and Aragorn for that matter, have been around for many, many years, and it would take many books to recount their many, untold adventures! But to make such a character do or say something, well, *out of* character is just plain bad form and bad storytelling. (Here again I might point to Jackson's ludicrous decision to have Gandalf whack Denethor with his staff; this is something that Gandalf - Tolkien's Gandalf - would never do in a million years, and it shows a complete lack of understanding of Gandalf, his principles, his values, his profound respect for Denethor - even though Denethor is at odds with Gandalf on many things - to suggest he would do such a thing.)

Nonsense. Yes, Peter Jackson took some liberties with it (as he usually does), but so what? It was a great read each time I've done so, and I'd very much love to be a part of it in LOTRO. The first significant victory for the free peoples in the War of the Ring is "hardly a blip"? Really? To each his own, I guess.